but they contradicted one another.  Then they asked the girl.  Poor thing, she had been so long neglected and abused, that she had forgotten her father, and the Moslem women had threatened to kill her if she said she was his daughter, so she declared she was born among the Bedawin, and was a Moslem in religion.  Money had been given to certain of the Mejlis, and they finally decided that the girl should go to the Moslem house of Derwish Effendi to await the final decision.

The poor father now went to the Consuls.  They made out a statement of the case and sent it to the Consuls General in Beirut, who sent a joint dispatch to the Waly of all Syria, who lives in Damascus, demanding that as the case could not be fairly tried in Tripoli, the girl be brought to Beirut to be examined by a Special Commission.  The Waly telegraphed at once to Tripoli, to have the girl sent on by the first steamer to Beirut.  The Moslem women now told the girl that orders had come to have her killed, and that she was to be taken on a steamer as if to go to Beirut, but that really they were going to throw her into the sea, and that if she reached Beirut alive they would cut her up and burn her!  So the poor child went on the steamer in perfect terror, and she reached Beirut in a state of exhaustion.  When she was rested, a Commission was formed consisting of the Moslem Kadi of Beirut who was acting Governor, the political Agent, Delenda Effendi, the Greek Catholic Bishop Agabius, the Maronite Priest Yusef, and the agent of the Greek Bishop, together with all the members of the Executive Council.

Her father, mother and aunt were now brought in and sat near her.  She refused to recognize them, and was in constant fear of being injured.  The Kadi then turned to her and said, “do not fear, my child.  You are among friends.  Do not be afraid of people who have threatened you.  No one shall harm you.”  The Moslem Kadi, the Greek Catholic priests, and others having thus spoken kindly to her, the father and mother stated the history of how the little girl was lost nine years ago, and that she had a scar on her breast.  The scar was examined, and all began to feel that she was really their own daughter.  The girl began to feel more calm, and the Kadi told her that her own mother wanted to ask her a few questions.

Her mother now went up to her and said, “My child, don’t you remember me?” She said “no I do not.”  “Don’t you remember that your name was once Zahidy, and I used to call you, and you lived in a house with a little yard, and flowers before the door, and that you went with the little girls to school, and came home at night, and that one day a man came and offered you sugar plums and led you away and carried you off to the Arabs?  Don’t you know me, my own daughter?” The poor girl trembled; her lips quivered, and she said, “Yes, I did have another name.  I was Zahidy.  I did go with little girls.  Oh, ya imme!  My mother! you are my mother,” and she sprang into her arms and wept, and the mother wept and laughed, and the Moslem Kadi and the Mufti, and the priests and the Bishops and the Effendis and the great crowd of spectators wiped their eyes, and bowed their heads, and there was a great silence.